This Week In Movies: Casting News For Pirates Of The Caribbean & X-Men Apocalypse

Awards season is in full swing as Eddie Redmayne gained another Best Actor win for The Theory of Everything, this time at the Screen Actors Guild Awards, and Birdman was awarded the prestigious Outstanding Cast in a Motion Picture trophy. Other highlights from the world of cinema this past week include casting and story news concerning the upcoming X-Men: Apocalpyse and Pirates of the Caribbean 5.

Casting News: Kaya Scodelario to join Pirates of the Caribbean & Games of Thrones actress Sophie Turner will star in X-Men: Apocalypse

Skins star Kaya Scodelario is set to appear in the upcoming Pirates of the Caribbean sequel Dead Men Tell No Tales. Twenty-two year old Scodelario is best known for her role as Effy on the seminal E4 show and has since followed in the footsteps of her Skins co-stars Dev Patel, Nicholas Hoult and Jack O’Connell by making a splash in Hollywood thanks to her leading role in last year’s The Maze Runner.

The fifth film in the Pirates franchise is due to begin filming in February in Australia and will see Johnny Depp return to the role of Captain Jack Sparrow, for which he was nominated for an Oscar back in 2004. Scodelario will play the female lead alongside Brendan Thwaites, who is rumoured to be playing the son of Orlando Bloom’s character Will Turner. Bloom, who last appeared in the third film At World’s End recently confirmed he has had discussions about returning to the franchise.
Many cinemagoers might argue that the Pirates series has never managed to recapture the magic of the original, The Curse of the Black Pearl, a movie beloved by fans and critics alike. Fans should suspend judgment for now because Dead Men Tell No Tales has a lot of promise. The casting is top notch: Javier Bardem (Skyfall, There Will Be Blood) is rumoured to be playing the film’s antagonist, Geoffrey Rush will return as Captain Barbarossa and the casting of up-and-coming actors Scodelario and Thwaites is a great way to breathe new life into the series.

In other casting news, Game of Thrones actress Sophie Turner will play the young Jean Gray in X-Men: Apocalypse. Director Bryan Singer tweeted the news on Thursday, announcing Turner would be joining the film alongside Tye Sheridan (Mud) as Cyclops, formerly played by James Marsden, and Alexandra Shipp as Storm, played previously by Halle Berry.X-Men: Apocalypse continues the X-Men prequel trilogy, which began in 2011 with X-Men: First Class and continued last year with Days of Future Past. The new X-Men films examine how Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) and Erik Lehnsherr (Michael Fassbender) become the sworn enemies they are depicted to be in the original trilogy. The prequel films have been a great success, concentrating on character as well as action and injecting star quality through the central trio of McAvoy, Fassbender and Jennifer Lawrence. X-Men: Apocalypse is due to begin filming in April 2015 in Montreal and will be released internationally in 2016.

Trailer: She’s Funny That Way

On Friday the trailer dropped for upcoming romantic comedy She’s Funny That Way in which Owen Wilson (Wedding Crashers, Midnight in Paris) plays a Broadway director whose attempts at interfering in the life of Izzy (Imogen Poots) – a prostitute with dreams of being an actress – have a series of knock-on effects he could never have anticipated.

The trailer bills the film as an ensemble comedy, in which Jennifer Aniston, Kathryn Hahn, Rhys Ifans and Joanna Lumley round out the talented comedic cast. The film was directed by Peter Bogdanovich (of The Last Picture Show fame) and co-produced by Wes Anderson, which perhaps explains why She’s Funny That Way’s ensemble cast and quirky sense of humour are reminiscent of Anderson’s distinctive style. Wilson is always a likable leading man, Poots is inherently charming, and the shades of 1990 mega hit Pretty Woman will probably only add to the movie’s appeal. She’s Funny That Way is due to be released in American cinemas in May 2015.